Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Demoralize   /dɪmˈɔrəlˌaɪz/   Listen
Demoralize

verb
(past & past part. demoralized; pres. part. demoralizing)
1.
Corrupt morally or by intemperance or sensuality.  Synonyms: corrupt, debase, debauch, demoralise, deprave, misdirect, pervert, profane, subvert, vitiate.  "Socrates was accused of corrupting young men" , "Do school counselors subvert young children?" , "Corrupt the morals"
2.
Lower someone's spirits; make downhearted.  Synonyms: cast down, deject, demoralise, depress, dismay, dispirit, get down.  "The bad state of her child's health demoralizes her"  Antonym: elate.
3.
Confuse or put into disorder.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Demoralize" Quotes from Famous Books



... him by giving him a whipping, and the end of the matter was that he ran away that afternoon. That is not the worst of it,—for the children all know the facts, and since they find that Stanley Owen can run away and be sustained in his disobedience, of course it tends to demoralize them. So I say that if I do my duty I am lashed by the tongues of people who know nothing of the circumstances; and if I fail to perform my duty I am lashed by my own conscience,—and between the two I have a sorrowful time; for I ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson

... unsympathetic despot: the decline of commercial activity, the multiplication of slothful lordlings, the depression of industry, the diminution of wealth, and the suffering of the lower classes from pirates, bandits and tax-gatherers. These conditions were sufficient to demoralize a people. And mediaeval Catholicism, restored by edict, enforced by the Inquisition, propagated by Jesuits, was not of the fine enthusiastic quality to counteract them. Servile in its conception, it sufficed to bridle and benumb a race of serfs, but not to soften or to purify ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... all wretched and hideous! The slime of politics and the smell of flaxseed unite to demoralize the man. O if Dr. Tarpion were only here! But Davy will take no medicine; how could ...
— David Lockwin--The People's Idol • John McGovern

... parlour, not touching the many bibelots there displayed, or disarranging the furniture, while the Wilbur twin would not only touch and disarrange, but pry into and handle and climb and altogether demoralize. In all the parlour there was but one object for which he had a seemly respect—the vast painting of a recumbent lion behind bars. It was not an ordinary picture, such as may be seen in galleries, for the bars guarding the fierce beast were real bars ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson

... good temper returning, and gazing in comic dismay at his favorite sister, much as he would at a dove who had ruffled its plumes. "This from you, Pamela? If Betty be allowed to demoralize the family in this wise, I think it were well my father takes you ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln


More quotes...



Copyright © 2025 Dictionary One.com